October 26, 2024

LA Times and Wash. Post endorsement of Harris would have made no difference, their non-endorsement helps Trump, by Hal M. Brown, MSW

 


Never-Trumpers are enraged that the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post owners overrode their editorial boards and wouldn't let them endorse Kamala Harris for president. Staff members on both papers are expressing both outrage and dismay. 

For example this is a portion of what Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus wrote:

I love The Washington Post, deep in my bones. Last month marked my 40th year of proud work for the institution, in the newsroom and in the Opinions section. I have never been more disappointed in the newspaper than I am today, with the tragically flawed decision not to make an endorsement in the presidential race.

You can read what she had to say without a subscription here.

Columnist Karen Tumulty, who joined the staff of the Post in 2010, wrote "Refusing to endorse a candidate, The Post wounds itself" She begins by noting the irony that "At a ceremony Thursday night in New York City, two of our Post Opinions colleagues received their Pulitzer Prizes for their courageous and tenacious work spotlighting the dangers of authoritarianism. 

She concludes with the following:

Editorial boards exist to make judgments and to speak for the institution. If this change in policy regarding presidential endorsements was a stand on some long-ignored principle of our past, why did the newspaper wait until just 11 days before the election to announce it?

Our current owner has emblazoned “Democracy Dies in Darkness” on the front page of every edition of The Washington Post. With this decision, those words now stand as an indictment of ourselves.

When I read about this at first I thought "so what" because the vast majority people that read these publications are voting for Kamala anyway.

Then I changed my mind. While an endorsement of Harris wouldn't have changed a vote this decision accrues to Trump's benefit. If he hasn't already done so he can spin it his way by saying that even the liberal press won't endorse "Came-a-la" because she's too liberal for them. He can rant on about how they see she's a communist and a fascist who will destroy our beloved American Democracy.

Ali Velshi just now on MSNBC in discussing this noted that Tim Snyder, the author of "On Tyranny"  calls what they did "anticipatory obedience"... I looked it up here.

Do not obey in advance.

Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.

Anticipatory obedience is a political tragedy. Perhaps rulers did not initially know that citizens were willing to compromise this value or that principle. Perhaps a new regime did not at first have the direct means of influencing citizens one way or another. After the German elections of 1932, which brought Nazis into government, or the Czechoslovak elections of 1946, where communists were victorious, the next crucial step was anticipatory obedience. Because enough people in both cases voluntarily extended their services to the new leaders, Nazis and communists alike realized that they could move quickly toward a full regime change. The first heedless acts of conformity could not then be reversed.

It appears that the owner of the LA Times, Patrick Soon-Shiong, may be a Trump supporter. We do know that he's friends with Elon Musk who like him was born in South Africa. The owner of The Washington Post, Jeff Bezos (who also owns Amazon) may or may not be a Trump supporter but he is clearly hedging his bets.

Both of them have given Trump more than a boost. They have given him a gift which, unlike a financial donation, doesn't have to be reported. 

If Trump wins look for him to try to exert pressure on them to "Murdochize" their papers. He could try to get them to squash unfavorable coverage of him or even fire staff who don't tow the line of his MAGAzation of the country. Could we see Tucker Carlson as the new editor-in-chief of The Washington Post? Their editor-at-large has already resigned over this. The editor of the LA Times and two other editors also resigned.

I have no doubt that Trump wants to control the media and that if he's president he will attempt to do this. These decisions have only served to whet his appetite. The dictator wannabe who admires Hitler for having loyal generals (even though some tried to kill him) if he knows anything about NAZI history is aware that there was no free press in NAZI Germany or the countries they controlled.


Who knows what the Supreme Court which gave the president immunity might do to reinterpret and the gut protections of the press granted in the First Amendment? 

Here's a review of the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Some have raised the question of whether the Free Speech Clause and the Free Press Clause are coextensive, with respect to protections for the media. A number of Supreme Court decisions considering the regulation of media outlets analyzed the relevant constitutional protections without significantly differentiating between the two clauses. In one 1978 ruling, the Court expressly considered whether the institutional press is entitled to greater freedom from governmental regulations or restrictions than are non-press individuals, groups, or associations. Justice Potter Stewart argued in a concurring opinion: That the First Amendment speaks separately of freedom of speech and freedom of the press is no constitutional accident, but an acknowledgment of the critical role played by the press in American society. The Constitution requires sensitivity to that role, and to the special needs of the press in performing it effectively.But, in a plurality opinion, Chief Justice Warren Burger wrote: The Court has not yet squarely resolved whether the Press Clause confers upon the ‘institutional press’ any freedom from government restraint not enjoyed by all others. The plurality ultimately concluded that the First Amendment did not grant media the privilege of special access to prisons.

Several Supreme Court holdings firmly point to the conclusion that the Free Press Clause does not confer on the press the power to compel government to furnish information or otherwise give the press access to information that the public generally does not have. Nor, in many respects, is the press entitled to treatment different in kind from the treatment to which any other member of the public may be subjected. The Court has ruled that [g]enerally applicable laws do not offend the First Amendment simply because their enforcement against the press has incidental effects. At the same time, the Court has recognized that laws targeting the press, or treating different subsets of media outlets differently, may sometimes violate the First Amendment. 

Further, it does seem clear that, to some extent, the press, because of its role in disseminating news and information, is entitled to heightened constitutional protections—that its role constitutionally entitles it to governmental sensitivity, to use Justice Potter Stewart’s word. 

Reference.

Why stop there? The Supreme Court could decide that a president has the right to interpret the Constitution any way they want to if Trump wins. They could also say he can suspend the entire Constitution. After all having a dictatorship is not compatible with having  a working Constitution. Does anybody think Trump wants the Constitution to restrain his dictatorial ambitions?



Excerpts from NY Times endorsement which begins as follows:

It is hard to imagine a candidate more unworthy to serve as president of the United States than Donald Trump. He has proved himself morally unfit for an office that asks its occupant to put the good of the nation above self-interest. He has proved himself temperamentally unfit for a role that requires the very qualities — wisdom, honesty, empathy, courage, restraint, humility, discipline — that he most lacks.

Those disqualifying characteristics are compounded by everything else that limits his ability to fulfill the duties of the president: his many criminal charges, his advancing age, his fundamental lack of interest in policy and his increasingly bizarre cast of associates.

This unequivocal, dispiriting truth — Donald Trump is not fit to be president — should be enough for any voter who cares about the health of our country and the stability of our democracy to deny him re-election.

For this reason, regardless of any political disagreements voters might have with her, Kamala Harris is the only patriotic choice for president.

The endrocement concludes:

In 2020 this board made the strongest case it could against the re-election of Mr. Trump. Four years later, many Americans have put his excesses out of their minds. We urge them and those who may look back at that period with nostalgia or feel that their lives are not much better now than they were three years ago to recognize that his first term was a warning and that a second Trump term would be much more damaging and divisive than the first.

Kamala Harris is the only choice.

 

Yesterday's blog: It's getting down to the wire and you've bet everything you have on one horse

Also these recent blogs:

"A LETTER FROM MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONALS ON TRUMP’S DANGEROUS PSYCHOPATHOLOGY" was published as an ad in The NY Times,

Fox News - Don't call this dignified wonderful gentleman a fascist because it may provoke another assassination attempt,

.About Hal M. Brown




Hal Brown
Hal Brown

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